‘And Paul said, “I did not know, brethren, that he was high priest, for it is written, ‘You shall not speak evil of a ruler of your people'.” '
Paul immediately admitted his fault. He informed them that he had not known that this man was the High Priest, otherwise he would not have done it. Perhaps there is also here the strong hint that if the man had behaved more like a High Priest he might have the better recognised him. Nevertheless the Scriptures enjoined the giving of proper respect to the leaders of the people when in office (Exodus 22:28), therefore he regretted it however deserved it might have been. In a similar way today we speak of ‘contempt of court'. We may hold the judge in contempt, but when he is officiating he represents the Law, and must therefore be treated with the respect due to his position, even if not for himself.
We must remember here that Paul had been away from Jerusalem for many years, apart from brief visits. He was not therefore familiar with the current High Priest. And at this ad hoc meeting the High Priest may well not have been robed. Indeed the fact that Paul had begun ‘men, brethren' does suggest that he had not recognised among those met together any particularly high level officials, for he usually uses the correct address. Although it might be that had he been seen as a respected Pharisee such an address would not have been seen as coming amiss.
This Ananias was an altogether unpleasant person and was in fact noted for his greed and arrogance. Josephus called him ‘the great procurer of money', partly because of his unscrupulous use of the trading in the Temple for gain, and partly because he was ruthlessly violent in extracting money from people, for example, in using beatings to extort tithes from the common priests' allotment and leaving them destitute. He was an extremely wealthy man and was not above using bribes and violence in order to increase his wealth and obtain what he wanted. Thus his treatment of Paul here was quite in character.